RockStar in Troubles without Grand Theft Auto IV?

Apparently, Take-Two’s financials were based on having Grand Theft Auto IV out the door this fall. Doubts have come up as to whether or not they can stay afloat without their flagship title on shelves…

But the delay in the mega game’s release has hurt Take-Two financially as it burns through cash and attempts to cut costs by restructuring its operations.

Take-Two had $61.62 million in cash at the end of July, down from $138.15 million at the end of January.

Last month in a filing with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission, the company disclosed it had increased its five-year revolving credit facility to $140 million from $100 million and secured it using the company’s assets in both the U.S. and Europe.

With its current burn rate, it could be drawing upon its credit facility in the first quarter by January or February, analysts say. That would make the timely release of Grand Theft Auto IV critical to the company’s survival.

After reading that, it might make some of us a bit nervous about whether or not GTA will hit shelves finished. I’m not too worried about it, though. Mostly because it’s GTA IV we’re talking about.

If it comes through on even a small bit of the promise we’re expecting and they continue with the amazing storytelling they’ve been doing for a couple of iterations now, there’s not a gamer out there that’ll be all that disappointed.

Unless, of course, they don’t have any multiplayer gameplay. I can see that causing a couple riots!

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Deejay Knight, Editor/FounderDeejay has been a gamer since the Atari 2600, has wrestled–and defeated–alligators with only his toes, and once aligned all the planets in the Solar System by uttering the words "Coo Coo Ka-Choo". In his sleep.
He currently bides his time behind the scenes here at GAMINGtruth.com, streaming at http://www.twitch.tv/deejayknight and teaching.

I agree with you in that if the game is any of what they say it is, people will be happy. Not every game that comes out needs multiplayer you know. How do you have multiplayer in GTA? Make it look something like Crackdown? I think personally it would ruin the game if they tried to shoe horn that in because that is probably what you would get. Rockstar is a fantastic company on many levels, I think they will survive this fine, especially with the episodic content supposed to be on it’s way with this GTA version.

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I agree with you in that if the game is any of what they say it is, people will be happy. Not every game that comes out needs multiplayer you know. How do you have multiplayer in GTA? Make it look something like Crackdown? I think personally it would ruin the game if they tried to shoe horn that in because that is probably what you would get. Rockstar is a fantastic company on many levels, I think they will survive this fine, especially with the episodic content supposed to be on it’s way with this GTA version.

http://eclipsic.com Mike

I think D’Juan might be right on the money with this one. It sounds as though Rockstar has everything invested in this game. If it were to fail, it’s possible (although not likely) that they would sink into oblivion. So their only recourse would be to release the game when their backing runs out of dough, no matter how unfinished it may be.

This is something of a paradox.. they need to release the game to stay afloat, but an unfinished game could massively hurt sales and sink them.

So I guess it all comes down to fanbase. Don’t throw stones at me, but personally I’ve never seen the GTA license as the huge monolith people seem to see it as. This could of course be attributed to the fact that I’ve only ever played the original GTA, lol. My question is, will the halo3-styled-buy-it-en-masse-on-day-1 fans be enough to support the game if an unfinished product is a dismal failure?

http://eclipsic.com Mike

I think D’Juan might be right on the money with this one. It sounds as though Rockstar has everything invested in this game. If it were to fail, it’s possible (although not likely) that they would sink into oblivion. So their only recourse would be to release the game when their backing runs out of dough, no matter how unfinished it may be.

This is something of a paradox.. they need to release the game to stay afloat, but an unfinished game could massively hurt sales and sink them.

So I guess it all comes down to fanbase. Don’t throw stones at me, but personally I’ve never seen the GTA license as the huge monolith people seem to see it as. This could of course be attributed to the fact that I’ve only ever played the original GTA, lol. My question is, will the halo3-styled-buy-it-en-masse-on-day-1 fans be enough to support the game if an unfinished product is a dismal failure?